September 10

I wonder if there's any scientific explanation for the reason why everything is worse at night. Maybe I'm the only person it happens to, but it's like I'm fine during the day and managing well but when I lie down to go to sleep at night, everything sets in and I can't turn my brain off long enough to fall asleep. The worst part about all of it is that all I really want to do anymore is sleep, but I never can. When I'm asleep, nothing hurts and everything is calm. When I'm asleep, there's nothing for me to think too deeply about. It's like a free trial of everything inside of me being calm and I'd give anything in this world to keep that up.

It feels weird to say, but I really miss Pennsylvania and I want to go back. It's funny because I spent the entire two months in that place desperate to get out and become tuned in to the real world again. But now that I'm tuned in to the real world, I wish I could tune back out and retreat back to the only place I felt safe. I think it's kind of counterproductive how they teach you everything you need to know to survive in that place, but nothing about what you're supposed to do when you're suddenly back in the same environment that broke you in the first place.

I guess I just miss the stability and possibly the routine. I miss having something to count on in my life. It wasn't much, but at least I knew that every day at 5:30, no matter what, I had group to attend and when the clock struck 7:00, it was my shower time.

Out here, I don't even know which way is up. Sometimes I come home to Mom making some elaborate dinner and sometimes she's not here and left money on the counter for takeout. For just once, I wish that something was the exact same when I got home after school. For just once, I wish that I could count on knowing that every day was going to be takeout or every day was going to be a home cooked meal. I just wish something in my life was stable and nothing ever is.

The strangest part about all of this is that I was never someone who wanted things to be predictable. Once upon a time, I loved for things to be shaken up and different from day to day, but now I'm the exact opposite. At least I think I am. I don't really know who I am anymore.

That's the scary part. I wake up every day not knowing which version of myself I'm going to get. I don't know if I'm going to be who I was before I had Beth or who I am now. I don't think it's possible the two of us coexist. Sometimes I feel like I took the old Quinn and stuffed her in a box and put her on the shelf and let this new Quinn take over. But the old Quinn is in there somewhere and she's dying to come out. I never know what I'm going to get with myself and I don't know who I am anymore and I'm scared that I'll never figure it all out.

I don't even know where I belong anymore and really, that's all I want. At least back in Pennsylvania, I was around people who were a lot like me. I had something in common with some of them. But here in Lima, I'm starting to wonder if there's anybody quite like me. At least it doesn't feel like it. I don't know how to explain it, but it's like when I walk around school every day, I feel like everybody knows something about me that I don't know about myself. It's uncomfortable and strange and I never felt this way before, not even in my old school.

It's like someone came in and turned on all the lights inside my body and made it hard for me to hide. All the lights are on all the time and every time I feel like I found a way to shut them off, somebody moves the switch.

It's the strangest feeling to be surrounded by people all day in school, but still feel so alone. At any given time, I'm surrounded by at least twenty people in school, but still I feel like I'm the only one roaming the hallways. In some ways, I wish I could run back to the comfort of Glee Club. When I think about all the things that went on between the four walls of that choir room, my heart feels like it swells up a bit and I'm overwhelmed with how much I miss it. It's the only place in this world, aside from Oakland Pines, where I felt like I belonged. But now it's strange because I don't even know that I'd belong in there anymore. It's supposed to be a group of all the people that are misunderstood in McKinley and really, it is. But I think maybe I'm a little too misunderstood for even the club to handle me.

When my hand gets a cramp in it, I decide to put the cap back on my pen, hit the switch on my desk lamp and try to go to bed again. I tried to fall asleep about an hour ago, but after lying there and doing nothing but tossing and turning and fighting to get comfortable, I gave up. I gave up, grabbed the red journal from my backpack and thought that maybe if I got all my thoughts down on paper they'd no longer be all bottled up and trapped inside of me.

I think my journaling worked. Because when I lie back down in bed, pull the blankets up to my chin and roll onto my comfortable side…

I'm finally able to give myself to sleep.


I don't know what's worse, smelling the food or actually seeing it in front of me. I know all the cafeteria ladies do is defrost the packages of pancakes and sausage then stuck them in the oven until they're hot, but the scent of pancakes and the maple syrup to go with them practically kiss the inside of my nostrils. When my stomach growls, I put my forearm across it as if that'll quiet it down and stop myself from looking at Mercedes and Sam's trays.

They look just as good as they smell…

"All I'm saying is that it's not supposed to, but I'm really hoping it rains today so our little impromptu performance outside is cancelled," Mercedes says as she stabs a piece of sausage with her fork. She and Sam have been discussing something about Glee Club for the past ten minutes and if my stomach wasn't growling so much, I'd actually be paying attention enough to know what it is they're talking about.

"It's not gonna do anything but get us slushied," Sam's voice is all muffled from his mouth being full. "I think he makes it his personal mission to make us look like bigger dweebs than we already do."

"That's why I'm saying, 'Please let it rain'," Mercedes replies.

I push on my stomach as another growl roars through it, willing it to stay silent. I'm so hungry I could eat eighty pancakes in a row right now, and that's just the thing. I'm so hungry and all I want to do is eat a million things right now but I'm sitting here in front of Sam and Mercedes. And if I start eating, I don't know that I'll be able to stop. The last thing I need is for the only two friends I have to see me looking like some 500-pound hog inhaling pancakes at the breakfast table. I'd rather starve.

"Do you even know what we're supposed to be singing?" Sam asks, mouth finally empty.

"I think a rendition of some Pink Floyd song or something. I don't know. I bet Rachel does," Mercedes starts looking around the cafeteria and suddenly I'm not hungry anymore, nope. Nope. I don't want to eat. All I want to do is get up and run away before she can — "RACHEL! Come here!"

Too late.

Quick, grab a piece of gum out of your purse. Your breath probably smells. No, just fix your hair. Make sure you look decent. Wait, no. Make sure your shirt is showing just the right amount of skin. No, no, no, Quinn. Act disinterested. Act like you don't care. Play it cool. Play it cool. Play it…

"Yeah?" Her voice falls on my ears and melts like fresh snow on an already wet sidewalk. I didn't realize how much I missed hearing her speak until she did and now all I can do is wait on edge until she says something else.

"What are we supposed to be singing today?" Mercedes asks and to my surprise (and pleasure), Rachel sits down next to Mercedes and across from me.

Remember how Jessica said a positive step is saying something nice to her and not letting your negative feelings win? Don't act from a place of compulsion. Don't act from a place of repression…

I have to physically swallow the urge to tell her that her headband looks like a blind preschooler picked it out and told her it would look nice with her already prepubescent toddler outfit. I have to swallow the comment that wants to come out of my mouth and tell her she looks like she shopped in the junior's section of Baby Guess. If only she knew how much thought and processing it takes for me to have an interaction with her…

I'm starting to wonder if this will ever stop and make sense with me. Because I really don't think all of those things. I happen to think that her headband looks really nice and I like the way it's navy blue and matches her cardigan. I think her outfit is simple, but really elegant. The navy blue cardigan over top of the bright yellow tank top and then the navy blue skirt… it's really nice. It's not my style, but it's Rachel's style and I think it's really cute. So why do I want to crap all over her outfit if I actually like it?

Because it's easier to hate her, Quinn. That's why.

I guess that's true. The easiest thing is to hate Rachel. It's easier for me to hate her than it is for me to like her. Liking her means something…. totally different. And something that I'm really just not sure I'm ready to even think about yet.

But why should I keep taking the easy way out?

"I like your outfit today," I mumble, barely looking up from the open organic chemistry book in my lap. I want to know what her face looks like right now. If I had to guess, I'd say she probably looks surprised. But I can't make eye contact with her. That's too much.

"I—I got it from — I — I — thank you, Quinn," she stumbles over the words and somewhere inside of me, I have a smile. But I don't let it show. "I like yours too."

But Finn kissed her cheek yesterday. She sat beside him, he kissed her cheek and according to Mercedes and Sam, they're back together.

See what happens whenever I allow myself to think?!

I slam my chemistry book shut, stand up and gather all my things so I can just go and get an early jump to class because ANYTHING is better than sitting here.

"It's the first time you wore something that doesn't look like a first grader threw up all over you," I look her dead in the eye when I say that and I know it stung, I know it did because she looks totally humiliated but I don't care because she deserves to hurt.

No she doesn't…

Yes she does. She deserves to hurt because she hurt me yesterday and I don't care if she doesn't know it. I hope her feelings are hurt just the way mine were yesterday when I saw him kiss her.

I don't care.

X X X

September 11

I don't think it's healthy to feel so much anger built up towards one person. I think it makes people mean and angry to be so hateful and frankly, it's exhausting. But it's the only logical thing I can do sometimes. Which makes me wonder if maybe I'm not a good person.

I want to be nice. I want to be good. So then I tell myself that it's okay if I go up to her and apologize for what I said at breakfast and give her the excuse that I was just tired and hungry, which isn't a lie. But just when I want to apologize, I see something like him holding her hand and I get so angry that all I want to do is hate and be mean because the alternative is just so much work.

I remember one time in a group session, Jessica told me that I'd have to learn to get over it because Rachel doesn't reciprocate the way I feel and I don't think I ever understood what she meant until today. It sounds scary, I think. Getting over it, I mean. Does that mean I have to find some way to live with all this rage I have inside of me because the way I feel about her will never be the way she feels about me?

That sounds miserable.

Maybe the only person I should be angry with here is myself. I can't imagine going through my entire life feeling this way about her, knowing that she'll never feel this way back. And it's times like this where I feel like maybe it would be easier for everyone involved if I just weren't here anymore because the only thing that sounds worse than her never feeling the way I feel about her is the fact that in a year, I'll probably never see her again. That used to be my saving grace; knowing that once we graduate I'll never have to see her face again. But ever since I got out of treatment, it's the one thing that's scared me more than actually having to admit to myself and to her that I feel this way.

It's all just exhausting and every time I think about it and try to make sense of it, I give myself a headache.

I want to be happy about my junior year and excited, because that's what it seems like everybody is. Every day before class starts, I hear everybody talking about which colleges they're going to apply to and what they hope to get on their SATs. It's not like they ask me to join in their conversations, but I realize that if they ever did, I wouldn't know what to say. Because that's not me anymore. I don't even know what colleges I'm going to apply to and I have no clue what SAT scores I need to even get into those nonexistent colleges. I used to have such a clear cut image in my head and a dream to get out of Lima and make something of my life, but these days… I can't even see my life through the next week.

It makes me wonder if maybe I should have just kept Beth. Jessica used to tell me that it didn't do anybody any good for me to think like this, but I can't help it sometimes because I feel like I gave up the only thing that gave my life purpose. Maybe I messed up God's plan for me after all. Maybe all along, I was meant to get pregnant and keep her and raise her and have that become my life. And maybe I screwed it all up when I gave her to Shelby and signed all those papers. Maybe that's why I can't truly be happy, because I messed up God's plan for me.

The school day kind of feels like one big blur to me because it's like I'm not really living in the moment. It's like I don't realize things are happening until they're actually happening and by the time I process it, it's over. I think this is what Jessica called dissociating.

Annual health checks were today, where we all got called out of class and down to the nurse's office so she could make sure we're all growing right. I used to hate health checks. But today, I was kind of excited for them and they were the only thing all day that took away the rage I felt from breakfast. When I stepped on that scale today and the nurse told me I'm 123, I felt a sense of relief wash over me because for the first time in a long time, I'm in control of something. I was 125 when I left the Pennsylvania. I may not be able to control where my life is going anymore, but at least I know that as long as I throw up every day; when I step on that scale, I'll be a couple pounds lighter. It made me wish that mom hadn't gotten rid of all the scales in the house a few years back.

Another weird thing happened today when Puck came into home economics class. I thought that maybe I'd be mad that he was in my class but instead, I smiled when I saw him. That's another part of me that's exhausting because it's another part of me that wages a war every day. Part of me feels like I hate him and want absolutely nothing to do with him, but the other part of me thinks I might love him and that disgusts me. He tried to talk to me a little and I mostly just ignored him because even though I smiled when he came into my class today, I still feel weird whenever he talks to me.

There was an assembly today for the junior class where Miss Pillsbury and Figgins talked to us about what junior year means in terms of college and SAT prep and I listened for the most part, but I couldn't help thinking that they weren't really talking to me. College seems like such a far fetch for me anymore.

I'm starting to think that maybe I should look into homeschooling. I'm just not sure I'm fit to be around people anymore.

When the final bell of the day rings, I pack my books up into my backpack, sling it over my shoulder and stand up. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm so glad to be going home after the day I've had. It's getting to be a real pain coming here every day when there's so many people I try to avoid. I spent the entire day trying to avoid Rachel after my outburst at breakfast and every second after home ec trying to avoid Puck. I'm starting to think that maybe I should just try facing my problems head on instead of avoiding everyone, but then that means I'd have to face my feelings and I'm just not sure about that.

The crazy thing about today is that I spent the entire day looking forward to study hall just so I could write down everything I felt the entire day. I thought that maybe if I didn't get the feelings out while I was feeling them, I'd forget that I felt them and then journaling would just be pointless but that didn't happen. When I sat down in a desk and pulled out my pencil and turned to a fresh sheet of paper, it's like everything just poured out of me and made its way onto the paper. Maybe Bailey has a point about journaling after all.

Anyway, Mom texted me after lunch and told me that she'd be late picking me up from school today because she had to stop at the dry cleaners. I don't know what I'm supposed to do in McKinley for however long it takes her to get here, but it's times like this where I wish she'd let me start driving again. I don't think she trusts that I'm over the whole suicidal urges she thinks I have. She hasn't let me drive since I've been back.

Since I have a few minutes to spare, I guess I could go try to get rid of a few things. The bathrooms will be empty because everyone's either going home or going to their extracurriculars, so it's a nice time for me to be alone. Plus, I always like doing it better here than doing it at home because at home, my mom is on high alert. She barely lets me take a crap in peace since I came home, so I doubt she'd let me be alone in the bathroom for a while. I usually have to wait until she goes to sleep to do it, which is kind of an inconvenience sometimes.

Just like I suspected, the bathroom is empty. So I leave my backpack outside on the sinks and go into the handicap stall, already tying my hair up so it doesn't get in the way.

It's almost like an instinct now, with the way I put my fingers in my mouth. But this time, when my shoulders hunch, nothing comes out.

Weird.

I hover over the toilet for a second with my hands on my knees, trying to think of something that'll make me gag. And it works, it does. When I think of Finn kissing Rachel with his big fat man tongue, I do gag. But then, I realize why nothing will come out.

Nothing's going to come out if there's nothing in there to come out. I haven't eaten anything all day… not even at lunch.

I'm a little disappointed, but not really because all that means is that when Mom goes to sleep tonight, I can binge. I can go downstairs, raid the fridge and eat until I blow up and it doesn't make me a greedy pig to do that either because I haven't eaten anything today. So I won't eat dinner either. I'll save all my room for tonight after she goes to sleep.

When I grab my backpack off the sinks and start back up the hallway so I can just wait outside for Mom, that's when it starts to hit me.

I wish Beth were still here. She used to make me feel good about eating. She used to make me feel like eating was… was… important, kind of. It didn't matter how much I ate when I had her, because she needed it and that alone was justification. She didn't make me feel like I needed to get rid of anything I ate and she didn't make me feel like I needed to hang my head when I ate. These days, all I feel is shame whenever the food touches my lips… these days, I don't want anyone watching me while I stuff my face.

I wish Beth was here.

With tears now streaming down my cheeks, I put my hands against the metal bar to open the door. But before I push it, I hear something…

"You swore and said we are not, we are not shining stars. This I know, we never said we are."

I take my hand away from the door and follow it. I follow those…. beautiful noises. And the closer I get, the more beautiful they sound…

"Though I never been through hell like that I've closed enough windows to know you can never look back."

My feet have a mind of their own, but it's like muscle memory with the way they instinctively go to the choir room. I linger there for a few more minutes. I hope they're not done… they sound really good…

"If you're lost and alone or you're sinking like a stone, carry on…"

When they say that, I have to tilt my head back and look up at the ceiling. I know I haven't been the best believer in God lately, but I still have faith. And I think he sent me to this choir room while they're singing this song for a reason…

"May your past be the sound of your feet upon the ground…"

"Carry on," I whisper to myself as a fresh round of tears come rolling on down. I reach into my back pocket and grab my phone just so I can shoot Mom a text telling her that she can just go straight home. She doesn't have to pick me up.

Not today.

Because I go inside the choir room.